Pokechu

I think you're all forgetting that while HW had a base roster of 13, multiple characters had different move sets (which are like having another character), so there were 20 unique move sets at the start. And the base roster was upgraded to 16 after the 3 villains, so the 20 is boosted to 23. 25 isn't much more than 23 and they've been really bragging about the roster size of this game, so it wouldn't make much sense to act like having 25 characters is amazing when there are clones (which may be included in the 25 because of Hinoka - she's a bit different from Cordelia but still shares some of the same attacks, and Lucina, who's similar to Chrom except she has different specials IIRC) and their previous Nintendo Warriors game had just two less. Not to mention how even with 25 characters there are still some holes that'd be missing. Cavalier lance? Dark mage? Knight? Second archer? Two beasts, maybe? Because surely they didn't add in stones/bows for just Tiki/Takumi. And that right there is six characters. With just two slots remaining, we still have to have villains and prominent characters that don't fall into categories above (e.g Caeda because surely she wouldn't be left out, Azura because they'd be stupid to not add her, etc.). I just don't see them having an okay roster if we only have 8 more characters.

oh god I know I'm the residential Sakura and Elise fanboy, but dont yall find it strange that there's a spot left by the little brothers of each kingdom and it would let Sakky and Elise conveniently slide on in? I think we can assume the main/central characters of each game will be somewhat together, because there's chrom/lissa/robin on one side, and frederick/cordelia/lucina on the other. Cords is kind of an outlier, but overall the central characters will be near each other. I think we all know the central characters for Fates' world will just be the royals. So it would be very strange to have retainers like Oboro or Effie next to Takumi and Leo. If they decided to put a retainer next to the little brothers, wouldn't it look nicer for the retainers to be alongside other non-royals and not just one retainer in a clump of royals? There's a reason the royals are at the top, and I don't think it'd make sense aesthetically or logically to put non-royals next to them. But at the same time, if it's only 3 from each side (no little sisters), why not center the one at the bottom? And obviously if all 4 royals from each side are in then it's a no brainer to put them all together. I think the only things wrong with this are Cords and Azura (there's no space around Corrin for her to be close to them... strange) but IDK I just noticed this and really wanted to point it out since no one's said anything about it yet

I know I'm very late, but I really want to know your take as to why the little sisters are less battle-ready than Lissa. Sakura taught herself how to use bows in Conquest and she's willing to kill Corrin and Azura, people she thought she could consider her siblings. That's battle-ready. Compare that to Lissa who almost got herself killed in Chapter 2 of Awakening. Not to mention how Sakura's one of the few potential scroll users and has a bit of plot relevance, for being a royal and more things (her distracting Iago, first sibling to join you in Revelations, etc.) Elise is a harder case considering how she's not a Strategist in Birthright ofc but she's actually seen Camilla in combat, this is said near the beginning of Fates IIRC, so Elise already has some battle experience, not as a fighter obviously but she's not new to battles. Lissa, on the other hand, has no real battle experience (I don't think any of the shepherds are veterans of combat besides Frederick? But I know I'm likely wrong) and she's 14 years old. I'd be willing to bet the younger sisters are older than that even. I know I'm very biased towards the cinnamon rolls but Hinoka is less important than Sakura and she got playable status. Whatever purpose Hinoka has could has been done through in-battle dialogue too, but that didn't stop them. And besides, purpose isn't always story related. Elise is our best troubadour/mounted cleric character, and Sakura is a cleric bow user who can potentially have scrolls in her moveset. It doesn't make sense to pass them up and say "NPC, they don't have much purpose" when they both have their own very unique niches.

I'm confused. I haven't played any Warriors games besides Hyrule Warriors, though. I'm still lost as to how Sakura and Elise are perfect as NPC's. They'd make really diverse characters to play as!

I wouldn't think that they're a perfect fit. They have relations with many other characters, which was a criteria when they decided on the roster. They're also very popular (Shoot, the little sisters are more popular than Lissa!) and Elise is plot relevant, and they're already more important than other characters because they're royals. If they can give Lissa an axe, I don't see why Elise and Sakura would be best as NPC's. Plus we wouldn't be able to have a mounted healer w/o Elise (no one's asking for Maribelle LOL) and Sakura could have some scroll moves while being a bow user; they'd both be pretty unique. True! The lack of Azura was very weird though considering she's basically a shoo-in lol. I really hope they're with Azura, otherwise it'd be very strange to have all of the siblings besides the little sisters

oh my god we have hinoka (cordelia 2.0..... I LOVE hinoka just less than my SWEET SMOL SISTERS :(((( but she's a lance pegapony like Cords :( )but not sakura or elise omg im dead whERE ARE MY CINNAMON ROLLS omg i really wanted sakura to use like a bow and elise to use like tomes and they'd be healers too and sakura could've had scrolls AAAAAAAAA nooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo on the flip side azura wasn't confirmed so maybe we get them with her but why announce every sibling AND NOT THEM this doesn't make sense oh my god all i wanted was sakura NoOoOoOoOoOOoOooOoOoOoooOoO considering canceling my preorder if this game has no cinnamon rolls yall wake me up inside when we get our sweetie pies ok???? no im serious i really dont understand WHYYYYYYY these little cuties would be AMAZING in this game!!!! my heart is shattered NOOOOOOOOOO how hinoka get in but not sakura?????? they basically score the same in popularity poll :(((( EDIT: SHOOT Elise got 4th I thought she kind of had to be in?????

Sorry for responding so late, I just realized you responded omg Robin is primarily a tome user, but he does pull out a Levin Sword for his special in this game. It's almost guaranteed Leo's attacks all use Brynhildr but I don't think it would be shocking for him to start or end one combo with a sword, you know? And Robin does have anima magic so Elise would be similar to him, but I think that because she's mounted and has no dark magic access, and has staff access, that she'd still be pretty different.. Plus, Robin has multiple dark magic spells iirc and a lot of people still think Tharja is very likely. And Chrom and Marth have Falchion and they're both unique. I thought a naginata was a kind of lance? I may be wrong but I could swear it was. It would be a bit strange though for Hinoka to use a naginata while the other lancers use normal lances, so you have me there. I don't think it'd be that big of a deal though bc IIRC Fates included naginatas under lances so I don't see why they couldn't do it here. I wouldn't be opposed to her being a clone at all though, it actually makes a lot of sense. They are both lance pegaponies, and I think they could make her different enough to be on par with Lucina, maybe more unique, if they made 4 different foot sword users (Chrom, one twin, Ryoma, and Marth. Excluding Xander bc he's mounted, Corrin bc dragon, and the 2nd twin and Lucy because they play similarly to another character). It'd be very interesting for Sakura to use scrolls though. Lissa ends a combo with thunder from her staff so now I'm hoping that if Sakura's a bow user, she still ends a few combos with scrolls. They would be so visually entertaining!

i'm sorry for this long post, I have a lot of bias towards the three girls but no one ever really discusses their potential in Warriors That's true, but we have many swordsmen already and we don't know the final roster. And I don't think Leo and Elise share the same niche; Leo has his own tome and uses dark magic. While they're both mounted, they'd play very differently, similar to how Chrom and Marth, despite them both using Falchion, seem to be different. Examples would be this; Leo can summon trees with Brynhildr. Elise cannot summon trees and would have to rely on Wind, Fire and Thunder magic. Leo has access to Nosferatu, which can restore his health. Elise does not have access. Dark magic and fire/wind/thunder magic have the potential to be completely different. Not to mention how Leo has sword access and Elise is a cleric. I don't think the two would be stepping over each other in terms of niche. I think it was said Lissa uses thunder from her staff as an attack, so I wouldn't be surprised if Elise pulls out her staff to freeze an enemy, allowing her to get more hits in. Plus, everyone's still betting on Caeda and we already have Cordelia, so if we can have 2 pegaponies I don't see why we can't have 2 mounted mages. You have me on Hinoka though, as she and Cords are both lance pegaponies, but I don't think seeing two lance pegaponies would be out of the question, as there's many kinds of lances they could use. Hinoka could use a naginata and play similarly to Impa from HW, being stronger but slower compared to Cordelia. I think it was confirmed characters of the same class would play similarly so Hinoka and Cords (if the former is in) would likely have the same moveset save for specials. Though I never saw much discussion about Hinoka, even before Cords was confirmed. Probably just me though. Sakura imo would be really fun to play and she doesn't really have overlap with anyone (save Takumi but he has his own weapon and she's a cleric). Could I ask why you'd prefer her to use scrolls? It'd be wicked cool to have her use them now that I think about it actually.

Hmm, I'm pretty late on responding to this but may I ask why the 3 royal girls seem less popular than the others? Sakura I can understand as she really did get last place out of all of the royals but Elise was 4th, beating out M!Corrin, Ryoma, Azura, Hinoka and Sakura (so Elise was in the middle of all of the royals in terms of popularity) and Hinoka was 6th, right behind Azura and tying with Ryoma. All three did really good, even compared to the other royals. Shoot, the only people who actually beat a royal are Oboro (who beat all of them bar Xander, Leo, F!Corrin and Camilla and she tied with Takumi), and Jakob (who beat M!Corrin, Ryoma, Azura, Hinoka, Sakura and tied with Elise). Niles got close (tied with Sakura). I'm just really confused as to why people never really noticed their popularity

Hmm... I think some of your placements are off. Spoilers are S, then A, then B complaints.

Hmm, I'm thinking that Hinoka might actually be a clone of Cordelia now. Especially because Cords has a helicopter move. I don't think it'd be hard to give Hinoka a unique moveset but she and Cords are both lance pegaponies so I don't see why they would want to spend that extra time on Hinoka.

Not really. We saw 7 characters at E3 and they called that 20%. If the roster size is really 25, then 7 would be more like 28%, closer to 30% than 20%. And if they can make 23 movesets for HW, I don't see why they could only make 2 more for this game and brag about how many characters they put in. The difference of 5 being 20% and 7 being 20% is 10 whole characters. It's falsely hyping people up because there's no reason to use 5 as 20% when we saw 7 characters. I'd be pretty disappointed if they were just making it bigger than what it actually is.

This may be true, but I think it's more than 25 due to two things; 1. The base roster of HW included 20 different weapons, therefore 20 different movesets. 25 is a really good number for Fire Emblem Warriors, but I think that because they're stressing and mentioning that FEW will have a real big roster that it'd be more than a 5 weapon difference than Hyrule Warriors. Also, the villains were added as free DLC not long after HW released, that makes it 23. So I think that because they had that many movesets for HW, and IIRC they weren't hyping up that game's roster size, they'll probably have around 30 (may be more; may be less) for this game because they're actually hyping up this game's roster size. 2. They know how much the roster means to fans. In another interview it was said that even developers of the game were upset at the limitations (only being able to pick from SD, Awakening and Fates), and that some of them even threatened to quit. Not to mention how in this interview they said they had debates over some characters, Lucina especially, they know that the roster is a controversial subject and really important to fans of the three games. I don't think they'd try to falsely hype us up over the size of the roster.

From the way Hayashi worded it ("just about 20% of the whole content" and at the time we had 7 characters) there's a chance it might even go past 30, which would be amazing.

May I ask why? I think it'd be pretty tedious having to level up what is essentially the same character twice.

As far as I know, Agitha wasn't a joke character but rather a developer favorite. That's why she got in. Hyrule Warriors didn't really have a joke character.

They could have used mostly in regards to there being multiple OC characters, so the focus would be spread on SD, Awakening, Fates, and Rowan/Lianna's world. Regardless, I don't think Ike and Roy are still that likely because if it's just those two that are outside the Shadow Dragon/Fates/Awakening triangle, why not package them as DLC? They are a business, after all. You can expect any characters you want. I'm not the person to tell you you can't, as I'm personally hoping for all 10 royals, but it wouldn't be surprising if Ike and Roy weren't included. amiibo really doesn't mean anything imho, considering they got theirs through Smash and not this game. If Ike happens to get in, cool. If he doesn't, I won't be shocked.

The game is focused on Shadow Dragon, Awakening and Fates. No one outside of those three games has to be playable. Why? Because they're from games that aren't being focused on. Fan rage on the internet aren't going to make them add additional characters they did not plan for. You say it'll be a lot of work to update the game for just a few amiibo but they did it with Mario Party 10 and Splatoon (which I just explained in my last post). Sometimes they feel the need to go back and update the game for the new amiibo, sometimes they don't. I'm just saying this shows that amiibo don't matter as much as you think they do. Roy and Ike may have been playable via amiibo in other FE games, but that's other FE games. This is a new spinoff that is specifically focusing on three games, those three being games that Roy and Ike do not appear in. Characters in Fire Emblem are nowhere near as complex as characters in Warriors. It's silly to expect characters to get in because they have a physical figurine.

Yeah, the amiibo are usable in other games. But that doesn't mean they have to be usable in this one and they have to get you a playable character. I never said they couldn't be DLC either. The FE amiibo were usuable in Codename Steam because that game was developed by the same people, Intelligent Systems. Yes, I realize the Corrin amiibo released long after Fates. They could still had gone back and done a little update or something though but they didn't care. When they went back and did more amiibo for Splatoon (Callie and Marie) they made them do something. Also, the Mario series Rosalina, Donkey Kong and Wario came out on the same day as Daisy and Waluigi, 11/04/2016, yet the first three were compatible and Daisy and Waluigi were not. Keep in mind Mario Party 10 released in March 2015, and even though a year and a half had passed they still made the new amiibo do something. And I don't know about you, but Waluigi and Daisy are VERY popular, I'd have to say probably the most popular spinoff characters for the Mario series. This just proves that amiibo don't guarantee an appearance in something. I never said Ike and Roy shouldn't ever be in Warriors, personally I wouldn't care either way. I'm just saying amiibo don't matter at all when it comes to a game's roster.

It wouldn't be ridiculous at all. A lot of work goes into making a playable character. They're not going to add in an extra 4 characters because "amiibo". There's been a lot of strange compatibility mishaps regarding amiibo too. The Corrin amiibo wasn't compatible with Fates lol. Daisy and Waluigi weren't compatible in Mario Party 10. All of the new Mario amiibo (Daisy, Waluigi, Boo, Diddy Kong) aren't compatible in Mario Kart 8 Deluxe, but the Splatoon amiibo are. And also this.

Just because they can be used in the game doesn't mean that they're guaranteed an appearance. There are amiibo that were made for use with Fire Emblem Warriors - Chrom and Tiki. That's the difference. Roy, Ike, etc. got their amiibo through Smash and Echoes. Chrom and Tiki got theirs through this game. You say Toon Link got to be in Legends, yes, but that's because that they literally focused on Wind Waker for that game. The new characters (at the start) were King Daphnes, Tetra, Toon Link, Skull Kid and Linkle, the first three from Wind Waker. Toon Link didn't get in because he had an amiibo. He got in because he's a Wind Waker character and they wanted to capitalize on that game in their HW port. Regardless, the first Zelda characters with amiibo were the Smash ones, meaning Link, Zelda, Ganondorf, Sheik and Toon Link. The first 3 are the core characters. They were guaranteed an appearance. Like I said before, Toon Link is a Wind Waker character and they focused on Twilight Princess, Skyward Sword and Ocarina of Time for Hyrule Warriors on the Wii U. Because Legends focused on WW he was definitely in. Sheik is iffy but she is literally Zelda, she wasn't that surprising to see. Also, Hyrule Warriors (for the Wii U) released a few months before amiibo did so how could they base their roster picks off of something that didn't exist yet??? amiibo has had no bearing on Hyrule Warriors or Legends, regarding their roster choices. amiibo doesn't matter.

I don't think anyone outside of Fates/Awakening/SD stands a chance of being in the game. amiibo doesn't matter because unlike Chrom and Tiki, Ike's/Roy's/Alm's/Celica's amiibo was/were not made for use with this game.

Oh, she did? Huh. It just seemed to me that if we had multiple F!Robin skins for M!Robin that it'd get really cluttered and messy. I never knew Cia had 3 variations for each skin. Now I don't really see a reason why she's a clone. It will really suck having to level the same character twice.

Female Robin makes sense as her own character because then she could have her own costumes/palette swaps/whatever. If she was an alt for Male Robin, it's likely F!Robin wouldn't have any additional skins; it'd just be one F!Robin skin for M!Robin. But because she's her own character, she can have her own costumes and not clutter up M!Robin's. But if F!Robin is actually completely unique then that'd be really stupid imho. It sucks how we might have to basically level up Robin twice but if you can buy level-ups like in Hyrule Warriors then I don't see it being too big of a problem.